A strange object I captured on the trail cam in the forest (photo frames, not video). It appears to be about a foot long, vertical and consists of 5 small equidistant ‘spots’. Bizarrely, it’s in the same location that we had a tree come crashing down in front of us today – the tree broke halfway up its height for no reason.
The object seems to move forward and then go upwards. There’s no way it’s an insect as they’re not out yet due to the cold. In the first couple of photos it’s to the right of the camera.

A 78 year old man from Prievidza (a town in the west of Slovakia) has died in hospital a week after being attacked by a stag. Apparently, it was a spontaneous attack as the man tended his orchard – the stag charged and skewered him with its antlers. More can be read here – noviny.sk – Stag Kills Man

Deaths from stag attacks are relatively rare, usually only one every so many years. Most often they’re during rutting season when people approach stags because they’re just standing still and not running away (which is because their brains are addled by rampant hormones). My kids and I were charged by one in the forest several years back and we had to hide behind a tree while it went berserk. 99.99% of the time the stag just flees though.

I knew there were Eurasian Lynx up in the heavily forested hills surrounding the village but I didn’t expect to find such an immense one wandering around a few hundred metres behind my house. I filmed it in the little wooded gully where I captured badger, pine marten, red squirrel, boar and red deer on the trailcam. It really made me think how often I’ve been kneeling down in the dark and damp with thick tree canopy above me not realising what might be looking down on me. They eat deer…

There’s never been an attack by Lynx on humans though, although they will go for domestic animals such as dogs and sheep (fox is part of their diet).

Eurasian Lynx are much bigger than their North American counterparts and are the third largest predator in Europe (ironically, we get the other two – wolf and bear – wandering around out the back also). They grow up to 130cms in length (only 10cms shorter than a cheetah) and can weigh up to 30 kilos.

This is a young Carpathian Red Deer I picked up on the Redleaf HD1000 trailcam. I can understand its scratching completely as every time I put the trailcam down in that damp, muddy, scat covered gully I come away covered in bites which itch for a week.

I know the photo is terrible quality but this really was a spur of the moment event and it’s literally only luck that got the bird in the picture. We were driving through the village when we passed a bird standing by the side of the road. It took a few moments for me to realize it was a Hoopoe (Upupa epops). I slammed on the brakes, put the warning lights on, left the engine running and got out to take a photo.

The bird flew off into a nearby tree. I walked towards it and it flew off again. For several minutes I followed but never had chance for a decent shot. eventually, it settled in a large tree and I could just make out its silhouette through the branches so I snapped one off. I thought I’d been unsuccessful until reviewing the photo later.

We used to have flocks of Hoopoe pass through in early summer on their way North but i haven’t seen any for a while. Maybe this one got left behind when they migrated back south.